“And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, that they found Saul and his three sons fallen in Mount Gilboa” (1 Samuel 31:8).

Some of you were at South Mountain, or Shiloh, or Ball’s Bluff, or Gettysburg, and I ask you if there is any sadder sight than a battlefield after the guns have stopped firing? I walked across the field of Antietam after the conflict. The scene was so sickening I shall not describe it. Every valuable thing had been taken from the bodies of the dead, for there are always vultures hovering over and around about an army, and they pick up the watches, the memoranda, books, letters, daguerreotypes, hats, and coats for their own use. The dead make no resistance.